Thursday, October 17, 2013

FANGASM: WEEK TWO

﻿Today I start catching up with the Syfy Channel’s Fangasm, the show
wherein seven fans are given internships with Stan Lee’s Comikaze
and are competing for an ongoing job with the company. I watched
episodes two through four of the show, but, before I get into them,
I want to make some preliminary comments.

I don’t know any of these interns. To the best of my knowledge, I
have never interacted with any of them online prior to the show’s
debut. Since then, I’ve been the recipient of one unhappy Twitter
message from Molly McIsaac who was sorry I didn’t love that first
episode. Me, too, Molly. Me, too.

All I know of these interns is what I see on Fangasm. I do realize
shows like these - “reality” shows - are easily manipulated by the
producers to convey whatever behaviors or conflicts the producers
believe will be the most entertaining for their audience. Since I
don’t know the interns, my comments are based only on what I see on
the show. Whatever comments I make, I’m commenting on characters
as put forward by the producers.

These interns are quite a bit younger than me. I’m old enough to
be their father and maybe even their grandfather. My reactions to
things are probably much different than theirs. I might be missing
some context to what these young people say and do because we have
had different experiences. They would face the same difficulties if
they were writing about the upcoming Syfy series, Grumpy Old Fan,
which will air early on Tuesday evenings on account of I can’t stay
up as late as I used to.

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“A Date with a Supermodel” aired October 1. This “date” consisted
of Paul and Sal going to a tequila bar with Adrienne Curry, former
“America’s Top Model” and a renowned cosplayer. Curry was there to
give the boys advice on meeting women. Sal seemed to think he had
“scored a date with a supermodel.” I remember how it was to be so
young and delusional. But I digress.

The very cool Regina Carpinelli is the CEO and Co-Founder of Stan
Lee’s Comikaze. This week, she asked the interns to create short
YouTube videos to promote the convention. The standout intern on
the assignment was Paul. He took the assignment very seriously and
was willing to work hard to do it right. After this assignment, I
picked him as the frontrunner in the quest for a permanent position
with the organization.

One thing I’m not seeing in these episodes is what the interns are
doing when they aren’t working on special projects. I’m sure that
isn’t as interesting as the special jobs, but it would give a more
rounded picture of the internships.

Miserable failures of the week were Andrew and Sal. I like these
guys, but they blew off the video assignment. At one point, they
cut out for the comic book store and then hid from their fellow
interns so they could read their new comics. Were it my call, I’d
have voted them off the island.

Dani conducted herself in a professional manner, as did Kristin in
a more low-key fashion. As for Mike and Molly, they are becoming
tedious. Mike’s self-image as a “player” has already worn thin and
Molly is prone to anger and drama. Neither would be a good fit for
a serious creative office environment. But these are just second
episode impressions. There are four more weeks of the series to go
before Regina and Stan have to decide which of the interns gets to
stay with the company.

Other scenes showed the interns hitting a club and the only thing
that keeps it from being the most awkward scene in the episode is
Andrew asking Curry to comment on his intern hook-up predictions.
Coming in third in the awkward competition is Sal crushing on Dani
and drawing a picture for her. He sneaks it into her room and then
claims Andrew drew it. Andrew calls it “middle school” and I think
he was being kind.

This episode is my least favorite of the series, but things really
picked up with the following episodes. I’ll be writing about the
third episode tomorrow.

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Also on my mind...

I find myself strangely excited about Marvel Comics reprinting the
Miracleman comics of Alan Moore and Neil Gaiman and continuing with
new stories by the latter and Mark Buckingham. It’s rare for news
from the Big Two to excite me, though I still read and enjoy many
Marvel titles.

This past summer, prior to putting them up for sale, I reread the
entire Miracleman series to date as published by Eclipse Comics in
the 1980s. I found them not quite as terrific as I had remembered,
but still pretty darn terrific and among the very best comic books
of that decade. I suspect my “not quite as terrific” is the result
of seeing so many concepts from Miracleman turn up in comic books
that aren’t terrific.

But, as I said, I’m excited about Miracleman and, as a side matter,
whatever Marvel is planning to do with Marvelman - the character’s
original name - in their Marvel Universe titles. I’m interested in
seeing how Marvel packages the reprints and could probably get into
another reading of the Moore/Gaiman stories while I’m waiting for
the new stories.

******************************

From The Ormes Society blog...

The Ormes Society, named after the legendary pioneering cartoonistof color Jackie Ormes, is an organization dedicated to supportingblack female comic creators and promoting the inclusion of blackwomen in the comics industry as creators, characters and consumers.

I love this informative and entertaining blog. I visit it daily on
account of there always seems to be something new there. If you’re
at all knowledgeable about my comics career, you know I have a keen
interest in characters of color. Even if your interest is somewhat
less keen than mine, I think you’d enjoy this blog. I recommend
it highly.

1 comment:

At this point I haven't seen beyond the "Date with a Super-model" episode, but hope to catch up. I get the feeling that if the 'rules' of the contest allowed there are a couple of folks that Regina would have already asked to leave the house.

Except for the episode with George Takai, where Andrew actually wept, I don't see him actually bringing anything of note to the table. Sal seems like a nice guy, but along with Andrew doesn't really seem to be interested in actually getting a job, but more in hanging out with other fans. Paul & Mike seem to be the most serious and I'd love to see Paul actually win the position. As for the ladies, I like all of them, but think that either Kristin or Dani would be the best choices. I like Molly's dedication to cos-play and her enthusiasm, but I find her way to tempermental and don't know what kind of a team-player she'd be at Stan's company.

Perhaps, I really don't understand the rules since everyone in the group has screwed up at least once and there seems to be no punishment or recrimination. Maybe I'm just spoiled by other reality shows where players are booted or voted out after failure. It will be curious to see how things go in the next few weeks.